Mobile application accelerator

ABSTRACT

Techniques for providing mobile device content delivery acceleration for mobile applications are discussed herein. Some embodiments may provide for a mobile accelerator system including a plurality of point-of-presences (POPs) and a control tower system. The control tower system may be configured to control mobile data transfer acceleration between a mobile device and the content server via the plurality of POPs of the mobile accelerator system. Each mobile application executing on the mobile device may be registered, validated, and then associated with a device POP that forms a dedicated connection with an entry POP of the plurality of POPs. Mobile data transfer acceleration for each mobile application may be selectively activated or deactivated, such as based on user configurations at the application level, domain name level, and/or country level.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No.15/094,904, filed Apr. 8, 2016, which is hereby incorporated byreference.

FIELD

Embodiments of the invention relate, generally, to networked contentdelivery for mobile devices.

BACKGROUND

Technologies such as Wi-Fi or mobile broadband (e.g., 2G/3G/long-termevolution (LTE), etc.) allow mobile devices, such as cellphones orsmartphones, to connect with remote content servers via the Internet.The speed of content delivery can affect the quality of data access andmobile device performance. For example, fast internet browsing, highquality video or audio data streaming, or multiplayer gaming may requiredata transfer rates that are faster than the capacities of conventionalmobile data networks. Virtually any mobile device application supportedby Internet connectivity is enhanced with faster data transfer rates. Inthis regard, improvements to networked content delivery for mobiledevices are desirable.

BRIEF SUMMARY

Through applied effort, ingenuity, and innovation, solutions to improvesuch mobile devices have been realized and are described herein. Someembodiments may provide for a system including a mobile device and amobile accelerator system. The mobile accelerator system may include acontrol tower system and multiple, interconnected point of presences(POPs). The control tower system may include an accelerator portalserver configured to: associate a client key with a mobile applicationauthorized for mobile data transfer acceleration via the plurality ofPOPs; provide the client key to a mobile device configured to executethe mobile application; subsequent to providing the client key to themobile device, receive a request to initialize the mobile data transferacceleration for the mobile application from the mobile device, whereinthe request includes the client key; in response to receiving therequest to initialize mobile data acceleration for the mobileapplication, validate the client key; in response to validating theclient key: determine an entry POP from the plurality of POPs; generatean initialization response including the entry POP; and provide theinitialization response to the mobile device to facilitate creation of adedicated connection between the mobile device and the entry POP for themobile data transfer acceleration.

In some embodiments, the control tower system may further include aglobal server load balancing (GSLB) server configured to determine anentry POP list based on a ranking of the plurality of POPs forconnection speed with the mobile device. The initialization response mayinclude the entry POP list.

In some embodiments, the GSLB server configured to determine the rankingof the plurality of POPs may include the GSLB server being configured todetermine the ranking based on one or more of: POP server load balance;POP server health check; mobile device geo-location; or mobile providerinformation or location.

In some embodiments, the control tower system may further include ananalytic server configured to: receive traffic data from the mobiledevice captured based on monitoring data transfers via the dedicatedconnection between the mobile device and the entry POP for the mobileapplication; and generate traffic metric data based on the traffic data.

In some embodiments, the accelerator portal server may be furtherconfigured to, in response to validating the client key, determine userconfiguration data for the mobile application provided by the merchantdevice. The initialization response may include the user configurationdata. The initialization response may be provided to the mobile deviceto facilitate creation of the dedicated connection when authorized bythe user configuration data.

In some embodiments, the user configuration data may define anapplication level configuration for the mobile application that enablesor disables the mobile data transfer acceleration for one or more mobileapplications executing on the mobile device on a per-app basis.

In some embodiments, the user configuration data may define a domainname level configuration for the mobile application that enables ordisables the mobile data transfer acceleration based on content serveraddress.

In some embodiments, user configuration data may define a country levelconfiguration for the mobile application that enables or disables themobile data transfer acceleration based on a current location of themobile device.

In some embodiments, the accelerator portal server is further configuredto, in response to validating the client key, determine managementconfiguration data for the mobile application. The initializationresponse may include the management configuration data. The managementconfiguration data may define a partial deployment configuration for themobile application that enables or disables use of the mobile datatransfer acceleration based on group membership of the mobile device.

In some embodiments, when authorized by the user configuration data, theentry POP may be further configured to: form the dedicated connectionwith a device POP of the mobile device; determine a dynamic pathtraversing one or more of the plurality of POPs; and route datatransfers between the mobile device and a content server through thededicated connection and the dynamic path. The device POP may be anetwork proxy server created by the mobile device for the mobileapplication when authorized by the user configuration data.

In some embodiments, a network proxy server address of the mobileapplication may point to the device POP. The entry POP may be furtherconfigured to receive the data transfers from the mobile application viathe device POP.

In some embodiments, the dedicated channel and the dynamic path may beconfigured to utilize a mobile accelerator protocol that facilitates themobile data transfer acceleration. The plurality of POPs may furtherinclude an exit POP. The dynamic path may include the exit POP. The exitPOP may include a protocol translation module configured to convert thedata transfers using the mobile accelerator protocol to a defaultprotocol of the mobile application.

In some embodiments, the dedicated channel may be configured to utilizea mobile accelerator protocol that facilitates the mobile data transferacceleration. The dynamic path may be configured to utilize a defaultprotocol of the mobile application. The entry POP may include a protocoltranslation module configured to convert the data transfers using themobile accelerator protocol to the default protocol of the mobileapplication.

In some embodiments, the entry POP may be configured to form multiplededicated connections with multiple devices POPs of the mobile device,each device POP associated with a different mobile application executingon the mobile device.

Some embodiments may include a method for mobile data transferacceleration of a mobile application, comprising: associating, by one ormore servers of a mobile accelerator system, a client key with a mobileapplication authorized for mobile data transfer acceleration via aplurality of POPs of the mobile accelerator system; providing, by theone or more servers, the client key to a mobile device configured toexecute the mobile application; subsequent to providing the client keyto the mobile device, and by the one or more servers, receiving arequest to initialize the mobile data transfer acceleration for themobile application from the mobile device, wherein the request includesthe client key; in response to receiving the request to initializemobile data acceleration for the mobile application, and by the one ormore servers, validating the client key; in response to validating theclient key, and by the one or more servers: determining an entry POPfrom the plurality of POPs; generating an initialization responseincluding the entry POP; and providing the initialization response tothe mobile device to facilitate creation of a dedicated connectionbetween the mobile device and the entry POP for the mobile data transferacceleration.

In some embodiments, the method may further include determining, by theone or more servers, an entry POP list based on a ranking of theplurality of POPs for connection speed with the mobile device, andwherein the initialization response includes the entry POP list.

In some embodiments, determining the ranking of the plurality of POPsmay include determining the ranking based on one or more of: POP serverload balance; POP server health check; mobile device geo-location; ormobile provider information or location.

In some embodiments, the method may further include, by the one or moreservers: receiving traffic data from the mobile device captured based onmonitoring data transfers via the dedicated connection between themobile device and the entry POP for the mobile application; andgenerating traffic metric data based on the traffic data.

In some embodiments, the method may further include, in response tovalidating the client key, determining user configuration data for themobile application provided by the merchant device. The initializationresponse may include the user configuration data. The initializationresponse may be provided to the mobile device to facilitate creation ofthe dedicated connection when authorized by the user configuration data.

In some embodiments, the user configuration data may define anapplication level configuration for the mobile application that enablesor disables the mobile data transfer acceleration for one or more mobileapplications executing on the mobile device on a per-app basis

In some embodiments, the user configuration data may define a domainname level configuration for the mobile application that enables ordisables the mobile data transfer acceleration based on content serveraddress.

In some embodiments, the user configuration data may define a countrylevel configuration for the mobile application that enables or disablesthe mobile data transfer acceleration based on a current location of themobile device.

In some embodiments, the method may further include, in response tovalidating the client key, determining management configuration data forthe mobile application. The initialization response may include themanagement configuration data. The management configuration data definesa partial deployment configuration for the mobile application thatenables or disables use of the mobile data transfer acceleration basedon group membership of the mobile device.

In some embodiments, the method may further include, when authorized bythe user configuration data, and by the entry POP: forming the dedicatedconnection with a device POP of the mobile device; determining a dynamicpath traversing one or more of the plurality of POPs; and routing datatransfers between mobile device and a content server through thededicated connection and the dynamic path. The device POP may be anetwork proxy server created by the mobile device for the mobileapplication when authorized by the user configuration data.

In some embodiments, a network proxy server address of the mobileapplication may point to the device POP. The method may further includereceiving, by the entry POP, the data transfers from the mobileapplication via the device POP.

In some embodiments, the dedicated channel and the dynamic path may beconfigured to utilize a mobile accelerator protocol that facilitates themobile data transfer acceleration. The plurality of POPs may furtherinclude an exit POP. The dynamic path may include the exit POP. Themethod may further include converting, by the exit POP, the datatransfers using the mobile accelerator protocol to a default protocol ofthe mobile application.

In some embodiments, the dedicated channel may be configured to utilizea mobile accelerator protocol that facilitates the mobile data transferacceleration. The dynamic path may be configured to utilize a defaultprotocol of the mobile application. The method may further includeconverting, by the entry POP, the data transfers using the mobileaccelerator protocol to the default protocol of the mobile application.

In some embodiments, the method may further include, by the entry POP,forming multiple dedicated connections with multiple devices POPs of themobile device, each device POP associated with a different mobileapplication executing on the mobile device.

These characteristics as well as additional features, functions, anddetails of various embodiments are described below. Similarly,corresponding and additional embodiments are also described below.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Having thus described some embodiments in general terms, reference willnow be made to the accompanying drawings, which are not necessarilydrawn to scale, and wherein:

FIG. 1 shows an example of a system, in accordance with someembodiments;

FIG. 2 shows a schematic block diagram of an example of a mobile device,in accordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 3 shows a schematic block diagram of an example of apoint-of-presence (POPs) of a mobile accelerator system, in accordancewith some embodiments;

FIG. 4 shows a schematic block diagram of an example of a device, inaccordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 5 shows a flow chart of an example of a method for initializingmobile application data transfer acceleration on a mobile device,performed in accordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 6 shows a flow chart of an example of a method for creating adedicated channel for mobile application data transfer acceleration,performed in accordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 7 shows a flow chart of an example of a method for mobileapplication data transfer acceleration, performed in accordance withsome embodiments;

FIG. 8 shows an example of an application level configuration interface,in accordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 9 shows an example of a country level configuration interface, inaccordance with some embodiments;

FIG. 10 shows an example of a country level configuration interface withdeployment control, in accordance with some embodiments; and

FIG. 11 shows an example of an application level deployment controlinterface, in accordance with some embodiments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Embodiments will be described more fully hereinafter with reference tothe accompanying drawings, in which some, but not all embodimentscontemplated herein are shown. Indeed, various embodiments may beimplemented in many different forms and should not be construed aslimited to the embodiments set forth herein; rather, these embodimentsare provided so that this disclosure will satisfy applicable legalrequirements. Like numbers refer to like elements throughout.

Some embodiments discussed herein may provide for mobile device contentdelivery acceleration. For example, a mobile accelerator module mayexecute on the mobile device that monitors outgoing queries to contentservers performed by the mobile device. The queries may be generated,for example, by virtually any application executing on the mobile deviceincluding an Internet browser application or other mobile applications(e.g., games, streaming audio or video, email, etc.) that access datafrom remote content servers via the Internet. In that sense, thetechniques discussed herein can provide content delivery acceleration tovarious third party applications.

In some embodiments, the mobile device content delivery acceleration maybe provided by a mobile accelerator system including a multiplepoint-of-presences (POPs) for accessing content from a content server.The POPs may be located at different geographical locations to provide acollection of access points to the Internet from the differentgeographical locations. A mobile device may form a dedicated transportchannel with a fastest (e.g., based on synthetic latency) POP of themobile accelerator system, or entry POP. The entry POP may then beconfigured to route data transfers between the mobile device and thecontent server through one or more POPs of the mobile acceleratorsystem. Based on a dynamic path determination that optimizes connectionquality measures such as synthetic latency, the data transfers may berouted from the mobile device, through the mobile accelerator system(e.g., to an entry POP via the dedicated transport channel, and then toa fastest exit POP), and then to the content server.

In some embodiments, the mobile accelerator system may be configured toprovide selective data transfer acceleration on a per-application(and/or other dynamically specified) basis for mobile devices. Themobile accelerator system may include one or more control tower systems.The control tower system may be configured to facilitate mobile deviceapplication configuration to use the mobile accelerator system for datatransfers between the mobile device and one or more content servers(e.g., that communicate with an application). The control tower systemmay include one or more servers and one or more databases, and may bepart of a POP of the mobile accelerator system, or separate from thePOPs that handle data transfer. The control tower system (or controltower POP) may include one or more accelerator portal servers, globalserver load balancing (GSLB) servers, analytics servers, and controltower databases.

The accelerator portal server may be configured to provide mobileapplication registration, and central management. For example, theaccelerator portal server may provide a website where a mobileapplication developer can sign up, sign in and download a softwaredevelopment kit (SDK) that allows for integration of a mobileapplication with the mobile accelerator system. The accelerator portalserver may be further configured to provide end user control andconfiguration of the mobile accelerator system functionality on themobile device.

The GSLB server may be configured to provide entry POP routing formobile device applications. For example, the GSLB server may use varioustechniques such as server load balancing, health checking, geo-locationdetection, consideration of mobile provider information and location(e.g. AT&T, San Francisco) to determine the optimal entry POP. In someembodiments, the GSLB server may be implemented as a representationalstate transfer (REST) web application programming interface (API)server.

The analytics server may be configured to collect various metricinformation for connections using the mobile accelerator system, run abig data processing engine to analyze traffic metric data, and store thetraffic metric data into the one or more control tower databases forlater lookup and mobile accelerator application interactions (e.g.,traffic view, per-country traffic information, performance comparisoncharts, etc.). In some embodiments, the mobile accelerator system mayinclude a collection of analytic servers configured to perform extract,transform and load (ETL) (e.g., streaming data handling, processingengine).

In some embodiments, a mobile device may include one or more mobileapplication modules, a mobile accelerator module, and one or more devicePOP(s). A mobile application module may be configured to execute anapplication on the mobile device that has been updated to use the mobileaccelerator system for data transfers between one or more contentservers (e.g., based on using the SDK). For each application to receivedata transfer acceleration, the mobile accelerator module may beconfigured to generate a corresponding device POP, such as uponinitialization of the mobile application. Each device POP may take theform of a network proxy executing on the mobile device. The device POPassociated with a mobile application may create a dedicated channel toan optimized entry POP (e.g., as determined by the GSLB server), anddata transfers speeds for the mobile application between the mobiledevice and the one or more content servers are improved based onoptimized routing through the POPs of the mobile accelerator system, aswell as protocol optimizations.

In some embodiments, the mobile accelerator module may be furtherconfigured to provide user configuration data of mobile acceleration,such as via an accelerator portal server that provides a user interface.For example, the accelerator portal server may provide for dynamic dataacceleration on/off switching (e.g., based on application levelconfiguration, country level configuration, or domain name levelconfiguration), mobile accelerator application management, registration,security, etc.

Exemplary Architecture

FIG. 1 shows an example system 100 in accordance with some embodiments.System 100 may include one or more mobile devices 102 (e.g., mobiledevices 102 a-102 c), mobile accelerator system 104, network 106, andcontent server 108. The mobile accelerator system 104 may include aplurality of point-of-presences (POPs) 110 and a control tower system120. As discussed in greater detail below, a mobile device 102 may beconnected with content server 108 via one or more of POPs 110 of themobile accelerator system 104 to provide content delivery accelerationbetween content server 108 and the mobile device 102.

The mobile devices 102 a-102 b may each be associated with a user.Although three mobile devices are shown in FIG. 1, system 100 mayinclude any number of mobile devices that may be associated with variousother users. Mobile device 102 may include cellular telephone (includingsmartphones and/or other types of mobile telephones), tablet, laptop,electronic reader, e-book device, media device, wearable device (e.g.,smart watch, smart glasses, etc.) and/or the like. In some embodiments,some or all of the techniques discussed herein with respect to a mobiledevice 102 and mobile acceleration may be applicable to a stationarydevice, such as a desktop computer, terminal, work station, server,among other things.

FIG. 2 shows a schematic block diagram of an example of a mobile device102, in accordance with some embodiments. The mobile device 102 mayinclude one or more mobile application modules 202, a mobile acceleratormodule 204, and one or more device POPs 206. The mobile applicationmodule 202 may be configured to execute an application on the mobiledevice that has been updated to use the mobile accelerator system 104for data transfers between one or more content servers 108.

For each application to receive data transfer acceleration, the mobileaccelerator module 202 may be configured to generate a correspondingdevice POP 206, such as upon initialization of the mobile application.The accelerator module 202 may be configured to (e.g., selectively)point the network proxy of the mobile application to the device POP 206.Alternatively, when the mobile accelerator system 104 is not used, themobile accelerator module 202 may be configured to point the networkproxy of the mobile application to a default network proxy. Each devicePOP 206 may take the form of a network proxy executing on the mobiledevice 102. The device POP 206 associated with a mobile application maycreate a dedicated channel to an optimized entry POP 110 a. As such,data transfers speeds for the mobile application between the mobiledevice 102 and the one or more content servers 108 may be improved basedon optimized routing through the POPs 110 of the mobile acceleratorsystem 104.

In some embodiments, the accelerator portal server 122 may be furtherconfigured to provide user configuration of mobile acceleration, such asvia an accelerator portal server that provides a user interface. Forexample, the accelerator portal server may provide for dynamic dataacceleration on/off switching based on application level configuration,country level configuration, domain name level configuration, as well asother functionality such as registration, security, etc.

The mobile accelerator system 104 may include a plurality of point ofpresences, or POPs 110. A “POP,” as used herein, refers to one or moreservers, routers, Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) switches,digital/analog call aggregators, etc. that provide an access point tonetwork 106 (e.g., the Internet) for another device, such as the mobiledevice 102. The POPS 110 may be connected to each other by dedicatedconnections (e.g., fiber optic lines, Network Access Points (NAPS),etc.) and employ protocols that increase the speed of data transfer overconventional Internet traffic. Although shown as being separate fromnetwork 106, in some embodiments, the mobile accelerator system 104 maybe at least in part supported by an Internet backbone of the network106.

Each of the POPs 110 may be connected with each other and located atdifferent geographical locations to provide a collection of accesspoints to network 106 from the different geographical locations. Forexample, in a six POP mobile accelerator system 104, interconnected POPs110 may be located in Singapore, Seoul, San Francisco, Tokyo, Dallas,and New York to form the mobile accelerator system 104.

FIG. 3 shows a schematic block diagram of an example of a POP 110 of amobile accelerator system 104, in accordance with some embodiments. ThePOP 110 may include one or more proxy servers 308. Each proxy server mayinclude a protocol translation module 302, a content router module 304,and an NProxy module 306. The protocol translation module 302 may beconfigured to provide a translation layer between a mobile acceleratorprotocol and conventional Internet protocols, such as the TransmissionControl Protocol (TCP). The mobile accelerator protocol may includevarious techniques that improve the rate of data transfer as discussedin greater detail herein.

The content router module 304 may be configured to determine a dynamicpath for data transfers between a device POP of a mobile device 102 anda content server 108, and facilitate data transfer routing accordingly.For example, the content router module 304 of an entry POP 110 a may beconfigured to determine whether to route data transfers between themobile device 104 and the content server 108 through the mobileaccelerator system 104 (e.g., through an exit POP 110 b), or directlythrough the network 104 (e.g., using the entry POP 110 a as the exitPOP). When used, the exit POP 110 b may be selected from the POPs 110based on providing the fastest direct connection access point to thecontent server 108.

The NProxy module 306 may be configured to receive incoming traffic ofthe POP 110 and route the traffic either through the mobile acceleratorsystem 104 or not based on whether the traffic uses a protocol that canbe optimized, such as HTTP or HTTPs. In some embodiments, some or all ofthe functionality of the NProxy module 306 may be performed by themobile accelerator module 204 of the mobile device 106. Additionaldetails regarding traffic protocol-based filtering and routing,applicable in some embodiments, are discussed in U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 14/863,339, titled “Software Defined Dynamic Filtering,” filedSep. 23, 2015, which is incorporated by reference herein in itsentirety.

Returning to FIG. 1, the control tower system 120 of the mobileaccelerator system 104 may be configured to facilitate mobile deviceapplication configuration to use the mobile accelerator system 104 fordata transfers between the mobile device 102 and one or more contentservers 108. The control tower system 120 may include one or moreaccelerator portal servers 122, global server load balancing (GSLB)servers 124, analytics servers 126, and control tower databases 128.

The accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to provide mobileapplication registration, central management, among other things. Forexample, the accelerator portal server 122 may provide a website where amobile application developer can sign up, sign in and download asoftware development kit (SDK) that allows for integration of a mobileapplication with the mobile accelerator system 104. The acceleratorportal server 122 may be further configured to provide end user controland configuration of the mobile accelerator system functionality on themobile device 102, such as based on communicating with the mobileaccelerator module 204 of the mobile device 102.

The GSLB server 124 may be configured to provide entry POP routing formobile device applications. For example, the GSLB server 124 may usevarious techniques such as server load balancing, health checking,geo-location detection, consideration of mobile provider information andlocation (e.g. AT&T, San Francisco) to determine the optimal entry POP110 a. In some embodiments, the GSLB server 124 may be implemented as arepresentational state transfer (REST) web application programminginterface (API) server.

The analytics server 126 may be configured to collect various metricinformation for connections using the mobile accelerator system 104, runa big data processing engine to analyze traffic metric data, and storethe traffic metric data into the one or more control tower databases 128for later lookup and mobile accelerator interactions (e.g., trafficview, per-country traffic information, performance comparison charts,etc.). In some embodiments, the mobile accelerator system 104 mayinclude a collection of analytic servers 128 configured to performextract, transform and load (ETL) (e.g., streaming data handling,processing engine).

The control tower system 120 may include one or more servers and one ormore databases at a particular location. The control tower system 120may be part of a POP 110 of the mobile accelerator system 104. Inanother example, the control tower system 120 may be a separate from thePOPs 110 (e.g., a dedicated POP). In some embodiments, the mobileaccelerator system 104 may include a plurality of control tower systems120 to provide backup, redundancy, distributed service, and/or disasterrecovery.

The mobile device 102 may connect with a POP 110 or the control towersystem 120 of the mobile accelerator system 104 via connection 112.Connection 112 may include a wireless connection utilizing Wi-Fi and/ormobile broadband technologies (e.g., 2G, 3G, 4G, and/or long-termevolution (LTE), etc.). In some embodiments, connection 112 mayadditionally or alternatively include a wired connection, such asEthernet, universal serial bus (USB), wired broadband, etc. Theconnection 112 may represent a “last mile” or final leg of the system100 for content delivery from content server 108 to the mobile device102.

In some embodiments, a mobile device 102 and/or entry POP 110 a may forma dedicated channel to optimize the connection between the mobile device102 and the entry POP 110 a. For example, the mobile accelerator module204 of the mobile device 102 may be configured to receive a POP listfrom the GSLB server 124 including a ranked listing of POPs 110 for useas the entry POP 110 a, and the highest ranking POP 110 may be selectedas the entry POP 110 a.

The data transfers between the device POP 206 and the selected entry POP110 a may be optimized based on translation into a mobile acceleratorprotocol. The mobile accelerator protocol may optimize the datatransfers using techniques such as compression, FEC (forward errorcorrection), 0-rtt connection, TCP optimization (large initial windowsize, optimized congestion control, etc.), and/or HTTP optimization(caching, compression, front end optimization). The connection betweenthe device POP 206 and the entry POP 110 a may be further configured tofacilitate data routing, such as through Layer 3 and/or Layer 4switches. In some embodiments, the device POP 206 and/or mobileaccelerator module 204 of the mobile device 102 may be configured totranslate outgoing data (e.g., data transfers, messages to contentservers, etc.) from a default protocol used by the mobile application,such as the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), into the mobileaccelerator protocol prior to sending the data to the entry POP 110 afor accelerated data transfer. In some embodiments, the mobileaccelerator protocol may also be used for data transfers between POPs110.

The content server 108 and the network 106 may be connected with an exitPOP 110 b of the mobile accelerator system 104 via a connection 116. Thecontent router module 304 of the entry POP 110 a may be configured toselect the exit POP 110 b from the POPs 110 of the mobile acceleratorsystem 104 based the quality of the connection 116 between the POP 110and the content server 108. For example, connection quality may bedetermined based on synthetic latency between the exit POP 110 b andcontent server 106 through the network 106, among other things. Theconnection 116 may represent a “first mile” or first leg of the system100 for content delivery from content server 108 to the mobile device102. The data in the mobile accelerator protocol may be translated tothe default protocol (e.g., TCP) by a protocol translation module 302 ofa POP 110 before the being provided to the connection 116.

In some embodiments, the connection 116 between the exit POP 110 b andcontent servers 108 may be supported with various functionality such TCPoptimization, connection pooling, and HTTP keep-alive.

The content server 108 may be an original host of content, oralternatively, may be a dedicated content delivery server or otherredundant host. For example, the content server 108 may be one ormultiple content delivery servers of a content delivery network (CDN).In some embodiments, such as when content is available from multiplecontent servers, the content server 108 may be determined as a nearestcontent server capable of providing the content to the mobile device 102and/or a POP 110 (e.g., such as based on access time for a uniformresource locator (URL) reference to the desired content). The contentserver may be configured to facilitate mobile application functionality,such as by transferring data with the mobile application module 202 of amobile device 102. In some embodiments, content server 108 may be a userdevice, such as a mobile device 102 configured to provide contentdelivery via the network 106.

The connections between POPs 110 (e.g., the entry POP 110 a and the exitPOP 110 b) may be optimized based on the mobile accelerator protocol tosupport various functionality such as 0-rtt connection, transmissioncontrol protocol (TCP) optimization (e.g., for a long haul network),hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) optimization (e.g., caching,front-end optimization), data compression (e.g., stream or packetlevel), encryption, connection pooling, and/or HTTP keep-alive. Theconnection between the POPs 110 may be further configured to facilitatedata routing, such as through Layer 4 switches.

In addition or alternative to connections between the mobile device 102and the content server 108 through the mobile accelerator system 104,system 100 may provide for a direct connection between the mobile device102 and the content server 108 through network 106, bypassing the mobileaccelerator system 104 when suitable. Here, the mobile applicationmodule 202 of the mobile device 102 does not use a device POP 206, andinstead uses the default network proxy of the mobile application.Connection 114, like connection 112, may represent the last mile forsystem 100, and may include a wireless connection utilizing Wi-Fi and/ormobile broadband technologies and/or a wired connection.

Network 106 may include a public network such as the Internet. Network106 may include one or more wired and/or wireless communication networksincluding, for example, a wired or wireless local area network (LAN),personal area network (PAN), metropolitan area network (MAN), wide areanetwork (WAN), or the like, as well as any hardware, software and/orfirmware for implementing the one or more networks (such as, e.g.,network routers, switches, hubs, etc.). For example, network 106 mayinclude a cellular telephone, mobile broadband, long term evolution(LTE), GSM/EDGE, UMTS/HSPA, IEEE 802.11, IEEE 802.16, IEEE 802.20,Wi-Fi, dial-up, and/or Wi-Max network. Furthermore, network 106 mayinclude a public network (e.g., the Internet), a private network, and/orcombinations thereof, and may utilize a variety of networking protocolsnow available or later developed including, but not limited to TCP/IPbased networking protocols.

FIG. 4 shows a schematic block diagram of example circuitry 400, some orall of which may be included in a mobile device 102, control towersystem 124 (e.g., accelerator portal server 122, GSLB server 124,analytics server 126, or control tower database 128) and/or a POP 110 ofthe mobile accelerator system 104. In accordance with some exampleembodiments, circuitry 400 may include various means for performing someor all of the functionality discussed herein, such as one or moreprocessors 402, memories 404, communications modules 406, and/orinput/output modules 208.

As referred to herein, “module” includes hardware, software and/orfirmware configured to perform one or more particular functions. In thisregard, the means of circuitry 400 as described herein may be embodiedas, for example, circuitry, hardware elements (e.g., a suitablyprogrammed processor, combinational logic circuit, integrated circuit,and/or the like), a computer program product comprisingcomputer-readable program instructions stored on a non-transitorycomputer-readable medium (e.g., memory 404) that is executable by asuitably configured processing device (e.g., processor 402), or somecombination thereof.

Processor 402 may, for example, be embodied as various means includingone or more microprocessors with accompanying digital signalprocessor(s), one or more processor(s) without an accompanying digitalsignal processor, one or more coprocessors, one or more multi-coreprocessors, one or more controllers, processing circuitry, one or morecomputers, various other processing elements including integratedcircuits such as, for example, an ASIC (application specific integratedcircuit) or FPGA (field programmable gate array), or some combinationthereof. Accordingly, although illustrated in FIG. 4 as a singleprocessor, in some embodiments, processor 402 may comprise a pluralityof processing components or means. The plurality of processingcomponents may be embodied on a single computing device or may bedistributed across a plurality of computing devices collectivelyconfigured to function as circuitry 400. The plurality of processingcomponents may be in operative communication with each other and may becollectively configured to perform one or more functionalities ofcircuitry 400 as described herein. In an example embodiment, processor402 may be configured to execute instructions stored in memory 404 orotherwise accessible to processor 402. These instructions, when executedby processor 402, may cause circuitry 400 to perform one or more of thefunctionalities described herein.

Whether configured by hardware, firmware/software methods, or by acombination thereof, processor 402 may comprise an entity capable ofperforming operations according to embodiments of the present inventionwhile configured accordingly. Thus, for example, when processor 402 isembodied as an ASIC, FPGA or the like, processor 402 may comprisespecifically configured hardware for conducting one or more operationsdescribed herein. As another example, when processor 402 may be embodiedas an executor of instructions, such as may be stored in memory 404, theinstructions may specifically configure processor 402 into a specificmachine that performs one or more algorithms, methods or operationsdescribed herein. For example, processor 402 may be configured toexecute operating system applications, firmware applications, mediaplayback applications, media editing applications, among other things.

Memory 404 may comprise, for example, volatile memory, non-volatilememory, or some combination thereof. Although illustrated in FIG. 4 as asingle memory, memory 404 may comprise a plurality of memory components.The plurality of memory components may be embodied on a single computingcomponent or distributed across a plurality of computing components. Invarious embodiments, memory 404 may comprise, for example, a hard disk,random access memory, cache memory, flash memory, a compact disc readonly memory (CD-ROM), solid state memory, digital versatile disc readonly memory (DVD-ROM), an optical disc, circuitry configured to storeinformation, integrated circuitry, chemical/biological memory, paper, orsome combination thereof. Memory 404 may be configured to storeinformation, data, applications, instructions, or the like for enablingcircuitry 400 to carry out various functions in accordance with exampleembodiments discussed herein. For example, in at least some embodiments,memory 404 may be configured to buffer input data for processing byprocessor 402. Additionally or alternatively, in at least someembodiments, memory 404 may be configured to store program instructionsfor execution by processor 402 and/or data for processing by processor402. Memory 404 may store information in the form of static and/ordynamic information. This stored information may be stored and/or usedby circuitry 400 during the course of performing its functionalities.

Communications module 406 may be embodied as any component or meansembodied in circuitry, hardware, a computer program product comprisingcomputer readable program instructions stored on a computer readablemedium (e.g., memory 404) and executed by a processing device (e.g.,processor 402), or a combination thereof that is configured to receiveand/or transmit data from/to another device, such as, for example, asecond circuitry 400 or other computing device. In some embodiments,communications module 406 (like other components discussed herein) canbe at least partially embodied as or otherwise controlled by processor402. In this regard, communications module 406 may be in communicationwith processor 402, such as via a bus. Communications module 406 mayinclude, for example, an antenna, a transmitter, a receiver, atransceiver, network interface card and/or supporting hardware and/orfirmware/software for enabling communications. Communications module 406may be configured to receive and/or transmit any data that may be storedby memory 404 using any protocol that may be used for communications.

Communications module 406 may additionally and/or alternatively be incommunication with the memory 404, input/output module 408 and/or anyother component of circuitry 400, such as via a bus. Communicationsmodule 406 may be configured to use one or more communications protocolssuch as, for example, Wi-Fi (e.g., a 802.11 protocol, etc.), Bluetooth,radio frequency systems (e.g., 900 MHz, 1.4 GHz, and 5.6 GHzcommunication systems), infrared, GSM, GSM plus EDGE, CDMA, 2G, 3G, 4G,LTE, mobile broadband, and other cellular protocols, VoIP, or any othersuitable protocol.

Input/output module 408 may be in communication with processor 402 toreceive an indication of an input and/or to provide an audible, visual,mechanical, or other output. Some example inputs discussed herein mayinclude user inputs for interacting with remote content servers, as wellas for user inputs that configure parameters or settings of mobileacceleration. In that sense, input/output module 408 may include meansfor performing analog-to-digital and/or digital-to-analog dataconversions. Input/output module 408 may include support, for example,for a display, touch sensor, touch screen, keyboard, button, clickwheel, mouse, joystick, an image capturing device, microphone, speaker,biometric scanner, camera, motion sensor, and/or other input/outputmechanisms. In embodiments where circuitry 400 may be implemented as aPOP, server or database, aspects of input/output module 408 may bereduced as compared to embodiments where circuitry 400 may beimplemented as an end-user machine or other type of device designed forcomplex user interactions (e.g., mobile device 102). In some embodiments(like other components discussed herein), input/output module 408 mayeven be eliminated from circuitry 400. Alternatively, such as inembodiments wherein circuitry 400 is embodied as a server or database,at least some aspects of input/output module 408 may be embodied on amobile device used by a user that is in communication with circuitry400. Input/output module 408 may be in communication with memory 404,communications module 406, and/or any other component(s), such as via abus. Although more than one input/output module and/or other componentcan be included in circuitry 400, only one is shown in FIG. 4 to avoidovercomplicating the disclosure (e.g., like the other componentsdiscussed herein).

In some embodiments, non-transitory computer readable storage media canbe configured to store firmware, one or more application programs,and/or other software, which include instructions and othercomputer-readable program code portions that can be executed to controlprocessors of the components of system 400 to implement variousoperations discussed herein. As such, a series of computer-readableprogram code portions may be embodied in one or more computer programproducts and can be used, with a device, server, database, and/or otherprogrammable apparatus, to produce the machine-implemented processesdiscussed herein.

Any such computer program instructions and/or other type of code may beloaded onto a computer, processor or other programmable apparatus'scircuitry to produce a machine, such that the computer, processor otherprogrammable circuitry that executes the code may be the means forimplementing various functions, including those described herein. Insome embodiments, one or more external systems (such as a remote cloudcomputing and/or data storage system) may also be leveraged to provideat least some of the functionality discussed herein.

As described above and as will be appreciated based on this disclosure,various embodiments may be implemented as methods, mediums, devices,servers, databases, systems, and the like. Accordingly, embodiments maycomprise various means including entirely of hardware or any combinationof software and hardware. Furthermore, embodiments may take the form ofa computer program product on at least one non-transitorycomputer-readable storage medium having computer-readable programinstructions (e.g., computer software) embodied in the storage medium.Any suitable computer-readable storage medium may be utilized includingnon-transitory hard disks, CD/DVD-ROMs, flash memory, optical storagedevices, quantum storage devices, chemical storage devices, biologicalstorage devices, magnetic storage devices, etc.

Embodiments have been described above with reference to block diagramsof components, such as functional modules, system components andcircuitry. Below is a discussion of an example process flowchartsdescribing functionality that may be implemented by one or morecomponents discussed above. Each block of the block diagrams and processflowcharts, and combinations of blocks diagrams and process flowcharts,respectively, can be implemented by various means including computerprogram instructions. These computer program instructions may be loadedonto a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or otherprogrammable data processing apparatus, such as processor 402, toproduce a machine, such that the computer program product includes theinstructions which execute on the computer or other programmable dataprocessing apparatus to create a means for implementing the functionsspecified in the flowchart block or block diagrams.

These computer program instructions may also be stored in acomputer-readable storage device (e.g., memory 404) that can direct acomputer or other programmable data processing apparatus to function ina particular manner, such that the instructions stored in thecomputer-readable storage device produce an article of manufactureincluding computer-readable instructions for implementing the functiondiscussed herein. The computer program instructions may also be loadedonto a computer or other programmable data processing apparatus to causea series of operational steps to be performed on the computer or otherprogrammable apparatus to produce a computer-implemented process suchthat the instructions that execute on the computer or other programmableapparatus provide steps for implementing the functions discussed herein.

Accordingly, blocks of the block diagrams and flowchart illustrationssupport combinations of means for performing the specified functions,combinations of steps for performing the specified functions and programinstruction means for performing the specified functions. It will alsobe understood that each block of the block diagrams and processflowcharts, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams and processflowcharts, can be implemented by special purpose hardware-basedcomputer systems that perform the specified functions or steps, orcombinations of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.

Mobile Device Application Acceleration

FIGS. 5-7 show flowcharts of example methods 300-500 related to mobileacceleration, respectively, in accordance with some embodiments. Most ofthe steps of methods 500-600 are generally discussed herein as beingperformed by components of system 100 discussed above. However, othersuitable devices, apparatus, systems and/or circuitry may be used. FIGS.8 and 9 show example interfaces or displays that may be presented on themobile device 102 to facilitate user interactions and configurations ofthe mobile acceleration.

FIG. 5 shows a flow chart of an example of a method 500 for initializingmobile application data transfer acceleration on a mobile device,performed in accordance with some embodiments. Method 500 may beperformed to integrate a mobile application configured to execute on amobile device 102 with the mobile accelerator system 104 to use thesystem 104 for mobile data transfer acceleration when suitable. Method500 may begin at 502 and proceed to 504, where a software developmentkit (SDK) may be initialized for the mobile application, such as whenthe mobile application is launched. For example, an accelerator portalserver 122 (e.g., of the mobile accelerator system 104) may beconfigured to provide the SDK to mobile application developer machines.The accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to host a web site,application, or the like, where application developers can sign up, signin and download the SDK. The SDK may include an initialization functionthat may be integrated with the mobile application. The applicationdeveloper may write the mobile application using the SDK such that theinitialization function is called when the mobile application islaunched on the mobile device 102. The integrated mobile application maythen be provided to the mobile device 102 for installation and/orexecution, such as by the mobile application module 202 of the mobiledevice 102. After installation of the mobile application, the SDK may beinitialized when the mobile application is launched on the mobile device102. Based on the developer registration and mobile applicationintegration, the mobile application may be determined as authorized formobile data transfer acceleration by the mobile accelerator system 104.As such, the mobile application may be configured to use the mobileaccelerator system 104 for data transfers.

At 506, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to receive arequest to register the mobile application (e.g., the user's copy) formobile data transfer acceleration. The request may be generated by themobile device 102 and sent to the accelerator portal server 122 as partof or in response to the initialization of the SDK integrated mobileapplication. For example, the user may sign up and create an accountusing a website or other portal provided the accelerator portal server122. Subsequent to the registration, the user may download, install anSDK of the mobile accelerator module 204 into the mobile applicationmodule 202, thereby adding the mobile accelerator module 204 to themobile device 102. The accelerator portal server 122 may provide forselective deployment of mobile acceleration on a per-application basis,such as by providing a user interfacing including an application list.The user may select the mobile application from the application list togenerate the request to register the mobile application, and the mobiledevice 102 may be configured to send the request to the acceleratorportal server 122.

At 508, in response to receiving the request to register the mobileapplication, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured todetermine a client key for the mobile application. The client key may bea per-application unique string or code generated by the acceleratorportal server 122, or some other component of the mobile acceleratorsystem 104, and associated with the mobile application. In someembodiments, each mobile application which is registered, authorized, orotherwise configured to use the mobile accelerator system 104 may have aunique client key. In another example, each instance of the mobileapplication operating on a mobile device may have a unique client key.

At 10, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to providethe client key for the mobile application to mobile device 102. Theclient key may be stored at the mobile device 102, and subsequentlyreturned to accelerator portal server 122 by the mobile acceleratormodule 204 for authentication and tracking (e.g., traffic for billingpurposes).

At 512, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to generateand store user configuration data for mobile data transfer acceleration.Furthermore, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured toreceive and store management configuration data for the mobile datatransfer acceleration such as from application developer or managementdevices.

The mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured to generate the userconfiguration data, such as based on user inputs via one or more userinterfaces presented by a mobile accelerator application. The userconfiguration data may include data defining application levelconfiguration, domain name level configuration, and/or country level (orother location or regional level) configuration. The user configurationdata may be provided to the accelerator portal server 122, where it isstored for subsequent use and updates.

When application level configuration is used, the mobile data transferfor each mobile application executing on the mobile device 102 may beindividually controlled (e.g., toggled on/off) by user on the mobiledevice 102. The mobile accelerator module 204 of the mobile device 102may be configured to provide the mobile accelerator applicationincluding a user interface. FIG. 8 shows an example of an applicationlevel configuration interface 800, in accordance with some embodiments.To facilitate application level configuration, the interface 800 mayinclude an application setting list including a listing of applicationsthat have been integrated with the mobile accelerator system (e.g.,based on using the SDK). For example, mobile application 802 may belisted within the application setting list, and the user may selectivelyenable or disable mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobileapplication 802 using on/off button 804. Mobile application 802 may befurther associated with displayed metadata 806, such as applicationversion, SDK version, initialization date, and country levelconfiguration settings. The user configuration data for applicationlevel configuration may be based on toggling the on/off button formobile applications within the interface 800, which may be provided tothe accelerator portal server 122.

When domain name level configuration is used, the mobile data transferfor mobile applications executing on the mobile device 102 may becontrolled based on user configuration data defining content routerdomain name constraints. For example, each mobile device 102 may beassociated with a whitelist or blacklist. The whitelist or blacklist mayinclude a listing of one or more domain names to facilitate the domainname level configuration for mobile data transfer acceleration. The userinterface provided by the mobile accelerator module 204 may beconfigured to facilitate creation and management of a whitelist orblacklist, such as by allowing for selection of whitelist or blacklistcreation, and for the updates to the created whitelist or blacklist withdomain names.

The whitelist, when used, allows mobile data transfer acceleration tofully qualified domain names (FQDNs) listed on the whitelist, butrestricts mobile data transfer acceleration for other unlisted FQDNs.The blacklist, when used, restricts mobile data transfer accelerationsfor FQDNs listed on the blacklist, but permits data transfers for themobile application to/from other FQDNs not on the blacklist. Thewhitelist or blacklist generated by the user interface of the mobiledevice 102 may be stored by the accelerator portal server 122, such aswithin the control tower database 128, and accessed to determineselective deployment settings of mobile data transfer acceleration fordata transfers to or from content servers 108 as identified by FDQN.

In some embodiments, a single set of domain name level configurations(whitelist or blacklist) may be applied across multiple (e.g., all)mobile applications. In another example, each mobile application orgroups of mobile applications may have different domain name levelconfigurations.

When country level configuration is used, the mobile data transfer foreach mobile application executing on the mobile device 102 may becontrolled based on mobile device location. FIG. 9 shows an example of acountry level configuration interface 900, in accordance with someembodiments. The interface 900 may include a map display 902 and a listdisplay 904, each of which may allow the user to selectively enable ordisable data transfers using the mobile accelerator system based onselecting on/off configurations for each country (or groups ofcountries). The country on/off configurations may be compared with thecurrent location of the mobile device 102.

In some embodiments, a single country level configuration may be appliedacross multiple (e.g., all) mobile applications. In another example,each mobile application or groups of mobile applications may havedifferent country level configurations. As shown in FIG. 8 within theinterface 800, each mobile application may include different countrylevel configuration settings, such as at 808 for the mobile application802. In some embodiments, the configuration level settings displayed at808 may provide a link or reference to the country level configurationinterface 900 for the particular mobile application. The interface 900may further include application name display 906 to provide usercontext.

The management configuration data may define parameters of mobile datatransfer acceleration for the mobile application as specified by thedeveloper, host, or owner of the mobile application. In someembodiments, management configuration data may define partial deploymentconfiguration. When partial deployment configuration is used, the mobileapplication developer may be allowed to define groups of mobile devicesthat are activated for mobile data transfer acceleration. For example, afirst group of mobile devices may be activated and a second group may bedeactivated, such as based on a rule such as a percentage of devices, athreshold number of devices, or any other suitable technique fordetermining group membership for accelerated devices. Partial deploymentmay be set at the application level and/or country level. FIG. 10 showsan example of a country level configuration interface 1000 withdeployment control, in accordance with some embodiments. Interface 1000may be provided to a developer or administrator machine to provide userinputs to generate the management configuration data. Interface 1000 mayinclude a map display 1002 and a list display 1004, each of which mayallow the user to selectively enable or disable data transfers using themobile accelerator system based on selecting on/off configurations foreach country (or groups of countries). For each country, the listdisplay 1004 may include on/off controls (e.g., controls 1006 and 1008)that allow the user to selectively enable or disable data transfersusing the mobile accelerator system for each country. For each countrythat has enabled data transfer, the list display 1004 may furtherinclude a deployment control 1010. The deployment control 1010 mayprovide for definition of device group memberships based on thepercentage of devices activated for mobile data transfer acceleration,such as from a 0% (accelerate none or the minimum number of devices) to100% range (accelerate all or the maximum number of devices). Forexample, if the mobile application is installed on 1,000 devices incountry X, and the deployment control 1010 is set to 30%, then 300devices of the 1,000 devices will receive an initialization response toaccelerate data transfers. The group membership for the 300 activateddevices may be selected randomly, or may be selected using othertechniques to optimize traffic within the mobile accelerator system,test the mobile accelerator system (e.g., A/B test), etc. Onceinitialized as ‘accelerated’, the subset of devices may keep using theaccelerated protocol until the connection is ended (e.g., applicationstops). In some embodiments, a predefined percentage of number ofdevices are not accelerated for data transfer/traffic comparisons, suchas 0.1% (e.g., even when the deployment control 1010 is set to 100%).

The country level configuration interface 1000 may further include anapplication level deployment control button 1012, which may allow theuser to control group membership for mobile data transfer accelerationfor the mobile application at the application level. FIG. 11 shows anexample of an application level deployment control interface 1100, inaccordance with some embodiments, which may be provided (e.g., as anoverlay to the interface 1000) in response to the user selecting theapplication level deployment control button 1012. The application leveldeployment control interface 1100 may include on/off control 1102 forthe user to selectively enable or disable data transfers using themobile accelerator system for the mobile application, and deploymentcontrol 1104 to provide for user definition of device activation groupmembership for the mobile application (e.g., from 0 to 100% of devicesactivated). The interface 1100 may be used to provide global partialdeployment settings across multiple (e.g., all) countries, and mayoverride or replace individual country level configurations when used.

At 514, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to receive arequest to initialize mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobileapplication from the mobile device 102. For example, when the integratedmobile application executed by the mobile application module 202 islaunched, the mobile application module 202 may be configured to callthe initialization function with the stored client key for the mobileapplication. As such, the mobile application module 202 may generate therequest to initialize the mobile acceleration for the mobile applicationand send the client key to the accelerator portal server 122.

At 516, in response to receiving the request to initialize mobile datatransfer acceleration for the mobile application, the accelerator portalserver 122 may be configured to validate the client key. For example,the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to match thereceived client key with a stored client key within the control towerdatabase 128. Furthermore, the accelerator portal server 122 may beconfigured to confirm that the client key is remains valid at requesttime (e.g., has not expired, been deactivated, hit a usage cap, etc.)

In some embodiments, the accelerator portal server 122 may be furtherconfigured to update or verify the configuration of the mobile device102, such as by updating the package name, app version and/or SDKversion if changed. As such, the performance and functionality of themobile device 102 is synchronized with any updates to the mobileaccelerator system 104.

At 518, in response to receiving the request to initialize mobile datatransfer acceleration for the mobile application and/or validating theclient key, the accelerator portal server 122 may be further configuredto determine user configuration data associated with or related to themobile application. For example, the user configuration data may defineapplication level configuration (e.g., whether data transfer for themobile application is enabled or disabled by the user), domain namelevel configuration (e.g., whitelist or blacklist), and/or partialdeployment configuration as discussed above at 412, and some or all ofthe user configuration data may be retrieved at 518.

At 520, in response to receiving the request to initialize mobile datatransfer acceleration for the mobile application and/or validating theclient key, the accelerator portal server 122 may be further configuredto determine an entry POP list. The entry POP list may define an orderedranking of one or more POPs 110 of the mobile accelerator system 104 forsuitability as an entry POP for the mobile device 102. In someembodiments, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured toquery the GSLB server 124, which may be configured to generate the entryPOP list, and return the entry POP list (and related data) to theaccelerator portal server 122.

The POPs 110 may be ranked based on “entry POP scores,” which may be ameasure of data transfer speeds between the mobile device 102 and thePOPs 110. In some embodiments, the entry POP scores may be determinedbased on one or more of mobile device IP address, network provider type(e.g., wifi or 3G/LTE), POP server load balancing, POP server healthchecking, mobile device geo-location, and/or mobile provider informationand location (e.g. AT&T, San Francisco) to determine the ranking ofentry POPs. The GSLB server 124 may be configured return to theaccelerator portal server 122 the list of available entry POPs, and foreach entry POP, the port and protocol to be used (e.g., the mobileaccelerator protocol, or a default application protocol). For example,an entry POP and protocol may be identified based on a text stringincluding an IP address of the entry POP and the protocol such as1.2.3.4:8891/np2 (e.g., mobile accelerator protocol) or 1.2.3.5:8891/tcp(e.g., TCP protocol). Additional details regarding optimal routing ofentry POPs and other components of a mobile accelerator system,applicable in some embodiments, are discussed in U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 14/644,116, titled “Mobile Accelerator,” filed Mar. 10, 2015,which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

In some embodiments, determination of the entry POP list is performedonly in response to determining that the mobile device 102 hasselectively enabled mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobileapplication.

At 522, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to generatean initialization response to the request to initialize mobile datatransfer acceleration for the mobile application. The initializationresponse may include the configuration settings for the mobileapplication (e.g., as defined by the user and/or the application host)and the entry POP list to facilitate initialization of a device POP. Forexample, the initialization response may include one or more textstrings indicating whether the device POP for the mobile application isselectively enabled or created by the user (e.g., IsProxy=On or Off),whether mobile data transfer acceleration is selectively enabled by theapplication host/developer (PassThrough=On or Off), the blacklist orwhitelist (e.g., blacklist={*.yahoo.com, www.neumob.com}; orwhitelist={*.neumob.net, www.google.com, www.yahoo.com}), and the entryPOP list with associated protocols/ports (e.g.,proxylist={1.2.3.4:8891/np2, 1.2.3.5:8891/tcp}).

In some embodiments, the initialization response may further include anindication regarding partial deployment configuration. For example, theinitialization response may include a “PassThrough” parameter, which maybe set On or Off based on the management configuration data. Theaccelerator portal server 122 may be configured to return in theinitialization response return one of the three states based on thedeployment configuration above: (i) IsProxy=0n, PassThrough=Off: mobiledevice POP and mobile data transfer optimization is activated; (ii)IsProxy=0n, PassThrough=On: initialize device POP, no dedicated channelfor mobile data transfer optimization will be created, but device POP isused for collecting traffic meta data for analysis; and (iii)IsProxy=Off: do nothing, such as by not initializing a device POP anddata transfer acceleration. The accelerator portal server 122 may beconfigured to determine the initialization response based on themanagement configuration data. For example, the accelerator portalserver 122 may be configured to determine group membership for themobile device as being activated or not so as to satisfy the specifiedpartial deployment. If country A is configured to 80% partialdeployment, for example, then a first group of 80% of user configurationdata requests result initialization responses will include (i)IsProxy=On, PassThrough=Off (fully accelerate), and a second group of20% of requests will include (ii) IsProxy=On, PassThrough=On (datacollection only). If country A is “turned off” (e.g., Afghanistan inFIG. 10), the initialization response may return (iii) IsProxy=Off,resulting in no creation or use of the device POP.

At 524, the accelerator portal server 122 may be configured to send theinitialization response to the mobile device 102. The mobile device 102may be configured to, based on the initialization response, selectivelyactivate or deactivate mobile data transfer acceleration functionalityfor the mobile application. As such, the accelerator portal server 122may be configured to provide a web service for the initialization ofmobile data transfer acceleration functionality on mobile devices on aper-application basis. Method 500 may then proceed to 526 and end.

FIG. 6 shows a flow chart of an example of a method 600 for creating adedicated channel for mobile application data transfer acceleration,performed in accordance with some embodiments. For each applicationexecuting on the mobile device 106, a dedicated channel for datatransfer using the mobile accelerator system 104 may be selectivelyenabled or disabled. Method 600 may be performed after method 500, whena mobile application has been initialized for data transfer accelerationby the mobile accelerator system 104.

Method 600 may begin at 602 and proceed to 604, where the mobileaccelerator module 204 of the mobile device 102 may be configured toreceive the initialization response from the accelerator portal server122. The discussion at 520 of method 500 may be applicable at 604.

At 606, the mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured todetermine, based on the initialization response, whether to initializemobile data transfer acceleration for the mobile application. Forexample, if mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobile applicationis selectively enabled (e.g., IsProxy=On, PassThrough=On or Off) whendata transfer is otherwise authorized by the mobile accelerator system104, the mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured to determine toinitialize the mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobileapplication.

Some embodiments may support partial deployment or data transferacceleration based on the initialization response. For example, theinitialization response may further include the PassThrough parameterdetermined from the user configuration data, and which defines whetheror not to use mobile data transfer acceleration based on groupmembership of the mobile devices that have installed the mobileapplication.

In response to determining to initialize mobile data transferacceleration for the mobile application, method 600 may proceed to 608,where the mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured to create adevice POP 206 on the mobile device 102 for the mobile application. Forexample, the initialization response may include IsProxy=On. The devicePOP 206 may take the form of a network proxy, and may serve as thenetwork access point for data transfers of the mobile applicationexecuting on the mobile application module 202. In some embodiment, asingle device POP 206 can be shared with multiple mobile applicationmodules 202 and/or mobile accelerator modules 204 for reducing CPU,memory, and network usage.

At 610, the mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured to point anetwork proxy server address of the mobile application to the device POP206. As such, data transfers for the mobile application between themobile device 106 and one or more content servers 108 may be routedthrough the device POP 206. Furthermore, the data transfers may berouted through the POPs 110 of the mobile accelerator system 104, suchas through the dedicated connection between the device POP 206 and theoptimal entry POP 110 a. In some embodiments, pointing the network proxyserver address of the mobile application results in the device POP 206functioning as the HTTP/HTTPS proxy for the mobile application. However,the device POP 206 may also be extended to support other networkprotocols used by mobile applications.

At 612, the mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured to create adedicated channel between the device POP 206 and an entry POP 110 a. Forexample, the entry POP 110 a may be selected based on the entry POP listreturned with the initialization response from the accelerator portalserver 122 at 604. The order of the entry POP list may define a priorityfor the dedicated channel. In the event that the highest ranking POP 110is not available to form the dedicated channel, the mobile acceleratormodule 204 may be configured to attempt creating the dedicated channelwith the next highest ranking POP 110, and so forth until a dedicatedchannel between the device POP 206 and an entry POP 110 a has beencreated.

In some embodiments, the dedicated channel may multiplex multiple TCPconnections (e.g., associated with different mobile applications) into asingle channel that utilizes the mobile accelerator protocol. The mobileaccelerator protocol may provide for one or more data transferacceleration techniques such as compression, FEC (forward errorcorrection), O-rtt connection, TCP optimization (large initial windowsize, optimized congestion control etc.), and/or HTTP optimization(caching, compression, front end optimization).

When the dedicated channel is created for the mobile application, thedevice POP 206 of the mobile device 102 is connected with an entry POP110 a of the mobile accelerator system 104. As such, the mobileapplication executing on the merchant device 102 is connected with themobile accelerator system 104, and data transfers for the mobileapplication with the content server 108 may traverse through the mobileaccelerator system 104 when suitable.

In general, the mobile device 102 may be configured to execute (e.g., inparallel) multiple mobile applications. Each mobile application maycommunicate with different content servers 108 to perform itsfunctionality. The mobile accelerator module 204 may be configured tocreate device POPs 206 for each mobile application to receive datatransfer acceleration, and form a dedicated channel between each devicePOP 206 and an optimal entry POP 110 a.

Returning to 606, in response to determining to not initialize mobiledata transfer acceleration for the mobile application (e.g., IsProxy=On,PassThrough=On), method 600 may proceed to 614, where the mobileaccelerator module 204 may be configured to create a device POP 206 onthe mobile device 102 for the mobile application. At 616, the mobileaccelerator module 204 may be configured to point a network proxy serveraddress of the mobile application to the device POP 206. The discussionat 608 and 610 may be applicable at 614 and 616. However, the dedicatedchannel between the device POP 206 and the entry POP 110 a is notcreated or used to route data transfers. The data transfers may berouted through the device POP 206 to monitor the data transfers fortraffic metric data collection and analysis even when data accelerationfor the mobile application is not initialized. Steps 614 and 616 may beperformed when data transfer is not initialized but partial deployment(e.g., PassThrough=On) is enabled.

Alternatively, in some embodiments where data acceleration for themobile application is not initialized and when partial deployment isdisabled (e.g., IsProxy=Off), the mobile accelerator module 204 may beconfigured to forego creating a device POP and dedicated channel for themobile application. As discussed above, the management configurationdata may define a partial deployment configuration for the mobileapplication that enables or disables use of the mobile data transferacceleration based on group membership, such as may be defined based ona percentage, number, etc. of the mobile devices 102 that have installedthe mobile application. When data transfer acceleration is disabled andpartial deployment is disabled, although data acceleration for thisparticular mobile application is not initialized, other device POPs 206and dedicated connections associated with other mobile applications mayexist. Method 600 may then proceed to 618 and end.

FIG. 7 shows a flow chart of an example of a method 700 for mobileapplication data transfer acceleration, performed in accordance withsome embodiments. Method 700 may be performed to handle data routing fordata transfer requests (and responses) generated by mobile applicationsto content servers 108. Method 700 may be performed after method 600,when a dedicated connection between a device POP 206 and an entry POP110 of the mobile accelerator system 104 has been created for datatransfers of a mobile application.

Method 700 may begin at 702 and proceed to 704, where the mobileapplication module 202 of the mobile device 106 may be configured togenerate a data transfer request for a content server 108. The datatransfer request may be generated by the mobile application module 202in the course of executing the mobile application. For example, themobile application may request content from the content server 108 tofacilitate functionality of the mobile application, such as video ormusic streaming, social networking, search, ecommerce, etc.

At 706, the mobile application module 202 may be configured to send thedata transfer request to the device POP 206. As discussed above, thedevice POP 206 may be set as the network proxy server address of themobile application, and thus data transfer requests by the mobileapplication may be forwarded to the device POP 206. The transfer requestmay include an IP address or domain name (or a “FQDN” parameter) of thecontent server 108 to identify the content server 108.

At 708, the device POP 206 may be configured to determine whether thedata transfer request is authorized based on configuration data. Theconfiguration data may include user configuration data definingapplication level configuration, domain level configuration, and/orcountry level configuration. The configuration data may further includemanagement configuration data defining partial deployment configuration(e.g., based on group membership). As discussed above in method 500, theapplication level configuration may be based on user inputs that togglemobile acceleration on/off on a per-app basis. Some or all of the userconfiguration data may be checked each time a data transfer request isinitiated to provide real-time user configuration. The whitelist orblacklist may be predefined by the user to provide domain name levelconfiguration for mobile data transfer acceleration. Furthermore, thedevice POP 206 may be configured to receive the whitelist or blacklistfrom the accelerator portal server 122 to facilitate the control of datatransfer routing.

The device POP 206 may be configured to compare the IP address or domainname of the content server 108 with the listing of FQDNs of thewhitelist or blacklist. The whitelist or blacklist can be checked to seeif the data transfer request should be accelerated. Only one whitelistor blacklist can be configured (not both). When the whitelist is set(Acceleration=True) and the IP or domain name (FQDN) matches a record inthe whitelist, the data transfer request may be accelerated. Forexample, when FQDN=www.yahoo.com, and whitelist={*.yahoo.com,www.google.com}), the IP address or domain name may be determined tomatch a record in the whitelist because www.yahoo.com matches*.yahoo.com, considering wildcard or regular expression string match.When the blacklist is set (Acceleration=True) and FQDN matches one ofrecord in the blacklist, this data transfer request is not accelerated.Otherwise, the data transfer request is accelerated. In someembodiments, at least a portion of the whitelist or blacklist may beprogrammatically generated based on analysis of protocol trafficassociated with content servers, as discussed in U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 14/863,339, incorporated by reference above.

The country level configuration may provide for selective mobile datatransfer acceleration depending on the current location of the mobiledevice 102. For example, the country defined by the current location ofthe mobile device 102 may be compared with the data transfer on/offsetting for the country to determine whether to the data transferrequest is authorized based on user configuration data. The currentlocation or country location of the mobile device may be determinedbased on any suitable technique, such as IP address, global positioningsystem (GPS) coordinates, cell-tower triangulation, etc.

In response to determining that the data transfer request from thecontent server 108 is authorized based on user configuration, method 700may proceed to 710, where the device POP 206 may be configured totranslate the data transfer request (or other data to be sent) into amobile accelerator protocol. For example, the TCP data packets of themessage generated by the mobile application may be translated intomobile acceleration data packets which employ various channeloptimizations techniques as discussed herein, such as TCP acceleration,data compression, data encryption, HTTP optimization, etc.

In some embodiments, the device POP 206 may be configured to determinewhether the data of the data transfer request is in a protocol that canbe optimized or translated into the mobile accelerator protocol, and maysend the data transfer request directly to the content server when theprotocol cannot be optimized or translated. Some or all of the trafficanalysis and routing functionality of the NProxy module 306 may beperformed by the mobile device 102.

At 712, the device POP 206 may be configured to send the data transferrequest to the entry POP 110 a using the dedicated channel. The devicePOP 206 may be further configured to send the FQDN and/or IP/domain ofthe content server 208 to the entry POP 110 a.

At 714, the content router module 304 of the entry POP 110 a may beconfigured to determine a dynamic path through one or more POPs 110 ofthe mobile accelerator system 104. For example, the dynamic path mayutilize another POP 110 of the mobile accelerator network as an exit POP110 b. Data transfers of the mobile application may thus be routedthrough the device POP 204, through the entry POP 110 a, through an exitPOP 110 b, and then to the content server 108 via the network 106 (e.g.,the Internet). Alternatively, the dynamic path may use the entry POP 110a as the exit POP 110 b. Here, data transfers of the mobile applicationmay be routed to through device POP 204, through the entry POP 110 a,and through the content server 108 via the network 106.

The dynamic path may be determined based on scoring and/or ranking datatransfer speeds (e.g., based on synthetic latencies) between thecomponents along various dynamic path options. Additional detailsregarding optimal dynamic path routing through a mobile acceleratorsystem, applicable in some embodiments, are discussed in U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 14/644,116, which is incorporated by referenceabove.

The user configuration data may be saved at the mobile acceleratorsystem 104 (e.g., within control tower database 128), or within themobile device 102, and inherited across versions and updates of themobile accelerator module (e.g., SDK) or mobile application.Advantageously, the user does not need to revisit the configurationsettings every time they update their applications with a new version.

At 716, the content router module 304 may be configured to route datatransfers between the mobile device 102 and the content server 108through the dynamic path. For example, subsequent data transferrequests, data transfer responses from the content server 108, or anyother data transmissions between the mobile device 102 and the contentserver 108, may be routed through the dynamic path. Furthermore,protocol translations may be performed such that the data used themobile accelerator protocol for portions of the dynamic path. Thededicated connection between the device POP 206 and the entry POP 110 aand/or the POP-to-POP connection, may utilize the mobile acceleratorprotocol while providing a translation layer to interface with thenative protocols of mobile applications and content servers 108.

Furthermore, translation from the mobile accelerator protocol to thenative protocol may be performed at various stages. In some embodiments,data transfers through the POPs 110 of the mobile accelerator system104, such as from an entry POP 110 a to an exit POP 110 b, may use themobile accelerator protocol. The protocol translation module 302 of theexit POP 110 b may provide a translation service that converts data fromthe mobile accelerator protocol to the conventional (e.g., TCP) protocolfor outgoing traffic, as expected by or compatible with the network 106and the content server 108.

In some embodiments, data transfers through the POPs 110 of the mobileaccelerator system 104, such as from an entry POP 110 a to an exit POP110 b, do not use the mobile accelerator protocol. The protocoltranslation module 302 of the entry POP 110 a may provide translationservices that convert data from the mobile accelerator protocol to theTCP protocol, before transmitting the data to an exit POP 110 b.Advantageously, translation to the mobile accelerator protocol fortransmissions through one or more of mobile accelerator system 104facilitates improved data transfer speeds, among other things such assecurity via encryption, data size via compression, etc.

At 716, the analytics server 126 of the control tower system 120 may beconfigured to generate traffic metric data based on monitoring the datatransfers for subsequent entry POP and/or dynamic path determination.For example, the device POP 206 may be configured to capture trafficdata associated with the data transfers such as whether the datatransfer request is accelerated or not, (b) protocol used (e.g., mobileaccelerator protocol or TCP), (c) URL for the request, (b) domain nameservice (DNS) time, (e) connection time, (f) SSL handshake time (for TLSconnection), (g) time to first byte, (h) time to content download), and(i) other performance metrics. In some embodiments, the device POP 206may be configured to queue the traffic data for each data transferrequest, and periodically send (e.g. every 10 seconds if there is queuedtraffic data) the traffic data to the analytics server 126. The mayperform further analytics using the traffic data to generate the trafficmetric data, such as performance comparison, usage tracking, errordetection etc. The traffic metric data may be used to subsequentlydetermine entry POP and exit POP routing. Furthermore, the trafficmetric data may be used to provide analytics to the mobile acceleratorapplication, such as traffic view, per-country traffic information,performance comparison charts, etc.

Returning to 708, in response to determining that the data transferrequest from the content server 108 is authorized based on userconfiguration, method 700 may proceed to 718, where the device POP 206may be configured to route data transfers between the mobile device 102and the content server 108 without traversing a POP of the mobileaccelerator system and without using mobile accelerator protocoltranslations. For example, the data transfers may be routed via thedirect connection 116 between the mobile device 102 and the contentserver 108 through network 106. Method 700 may then proceed to 720 andend.

CONCLUSION

Many modifications and other embodiments will come to mind to oneskilled in the art to which these embodiments pertain having the benefitof the teachings presented in the foregoing descriptions and theassociated drawings. For example, while techniques for mobile deviceacceleration are discussed herein as being performed over the Internet,they may also be applicable to data delivery acceleration on other widearea networks and/or other (e.g., stationary, wired communication)devices. Therefore, it is to be understood that embodiments andimplementations are not to be limited to the specific examples disclosedand that modifications and other embodiments are intended to be includedwithin the scope of the appended claims.

That which is claimed:
 1. A mobile accelerator system, comprising: acontrol tower system, including: an accelerator portal server configuredto: associate a client key with a mobile application authorized formobile data transfer acceleration via a plurality of POPs; provide theclient key to a mobile device configured to execute the mobileapplication; subsequent to the provide of the client key to the mobiledevice, receive a request to initialize the mobile data transferacceleration for the mobile application from the mobile device, whereinthe request is to include the client key; in response to receipt of therequest to initialize mobile data acceleration for the mobileapplication, validate the client key; in response to validation of theclient key: determine an entry POP from the plurality of POPs; generatean initialization response including the entry POP; and provide theinitialization response to the mobile device to facilitate creation of adedicated connection between the mobile device and a content server viathe entry POP for the mobile data transfer acceleration.
 2. The systemof claim 1, wherein: the control tower system further includes a globalserver load balancing (GSLB) server configured to determine an entry POPlist based on a ranking of the plurality of POPs for connection speedwith the mobile device; and the initialization response is to includethe entry POP list.
 3. The system of claim 2, wherein the GSLB serverconfigured to determine the ranking of the plurality of POPs includesthe GSLB server being configured to determine the ranking based on oneor more of: POP server load balance; POP server health check; mobiledevice geo-location; or mobile provider information or location;
 4. Thesystem of claim 1, wherein the control tower system further includes ananalytic server configured to: receive traffic data from the mobiledevice captured based on monitoring data transfers via the dedicatedconnection between the mobile device and the entry POP for the mobileapplication; and generate traffic metric data based on the traffic data.5. The system of claim 1, wherein: the accelerator portal server isfurther configured to, in response to validation of the client key,determine user configuration data for the mobile application provided bythe mobile device; the initialization response is to include the userconfiguration data; and the initialization response is to be provided tothe mobile device to facilitate creation of the dedicated connectionwhen authorized by the user configuration data.
 6. The system of claim5, wherein the user configuration data is to define an application levelconfiguration for the mobile application that enables or disables themobile data transfer acceleration for one or more mobile applicationsexecuting on the mobile device on a per-app basis.
 7. The system ofclaim 5, wherein the user configuration data is to define a domain namelevel configuration for the mobile application that enables or disablesthe mobile data transfer acceleration based on content server address.8. The system of claim 5, wherein the user configuration data is todefine a country level configuration for the mobile application thatenables or disables the mobile data transfer acceleration based on acurrent location of the mobile device.
 9. The system of claim 1,wherein: the accelerator portal server is further configured to, inresponse to validation of the client key, determine managementconfiguration data for the mobile application; the initializationresponse is to include the management configuration data; and themanagement configuration data is to define a partial deploymentconfiguration for the mobile application that enables or disables use ofthe mobile data transfer acceleration based on group membership of themobile device.
 10. The system of claim 5, wherein: when authorized bythe user configuration data, the entry POP is further configured to:form the dedicated connection with a device POP of the mobile device;determine a dynamic path traversing one or more of the plurality ofPOPs; and route data transfers between the mobile device and the contentserver through the dedicated connection and the dynamic path; and thedevice POP is a network proxy server created by the mobile device forthe mobile application when authorized by the user configuration data.11. The system of claim 10, wherein: a network proxy server address ofthe mobile application points to the device POP; and the entry POP isfurther configured to receive the data transfers from the mobileapplication via the device POP.
 12. The system of claim 10, wherein: thededicated connection and the dynamic path are configured to utilize amobile accelerator protocol that facilitates the mobile data transferacceleration; the plurality of POPs further includes an exit POP; thedynamic path includes the exit POP; and the exit POP includes a protocoltranslation module configured to convert the data transfers using themobile accelerator protocol to a default protocol of the mobileapplication.
 13. The system of claim 10, wherein: the dedicatedconnection is configured to utilize a mobile accelerator protocol thatfacilitates the mobile data transfer acceleration; the dynamic path isconfigured to utilize a default protocol of the mobile application; andthe entry POP includes a protocol translation module configured toconvert the data transfers using the mobile accelerator protocol to thedefault protocol of the mobile application.
 14. The system of claim 1,wherein the entry POP is configured to form multiple dedicatedconnections with multiple devices POPs of the mobile device, each devicePOP associated with a different mobile application executing on themobile device.
 15. A method for mobile data transfer acceleration of amobile application, comprising: associating, by one or more servers of amobile accelerator system, a client key with a mobile applicationauthorized for mobile data transfer acceleration via a plurality of POPsof the mobile accelerator system; providing, by the one or more servers,the client key to a mobile device configured to execute the mobileapplication; subsequent to providing the client key to the mobiledevice, and by the one or more servers, receiving a request toinitialize the mobile data transfer acceleration for the mobileapplication from the mobile device, wherein the request includes theclient key; in response to receiving the request to initialize mobiledata acceleration for the mobile application, and by the one or moreservers, validating the client key; and in response to validating theclient key, and by the one or more servers: determining an entry POPfrom the plurality of POPs; generating an initialization responseincluding the entry POP; and providing the initialization response tothe mobile device to facilitate creation of a dedicated connectionbetween the mobile device and a content server via the entry POP for themobile data transfer acceleration.
 16. The method of claim 15, furthercomprising determining, by the one or more servers, an entry POP listbased on a ranking of the plurality of POPs for connection speed withthe mobile device, and wherein the initialization response includes theentry POP list.
 17. The method of claim 16, wherein determining theranking of the plurality of POPs includes determining the ranking basedon one or more of: POP server load balance; POP server health check;mobile device geo-location; or mobile provider information or location.18. The method of claim 15 further comprising, by the one or moreservers: receiving traffic data from the mobile device captured based onmonitoring data transfers via the dedicated connection between themobile device and the entry POP for the mobile application; andgenerating traffic metric data based on the traffic data.
 19. The methodof claim 15, wherein: further in response to validating the client key,determining user configuration data for the mobile application providedby the merchant device; the initialization response includes the userconfiguration data; and the initialization response is provided to themobile device to facilitate creation of the dedicated connection whenauthorized by the user configuration data.
 20. The method of claim 19,wherein the user configuration data defines an application levelconfiguration for the mobile application that enables or disables themobile data transfer acceleration for one or more mobile applicationsexecuting on the mobile device on a per-app basis.